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Last week’s funding headlines in Japan were dominated by media firms. Japan’s consumer market has a deep interest in high-quality content. Some of the startups below will help those users scratch their cooking, fishing, and traveling itches.

The other services receiving new funds are dedicated to manufacturing materials, social promotion, and getting you a better night’s rest.

Also, make sure you read to the end to find out who got acquired!

Dely

Photo credit: Alexas Fotos.

Dely is reborn and just scored US$5 million in a series A. YJ Capital, Gumi Ventures, and United all joined the latest round.

Launched in 2014 as a food delivery service by Yusuke Horie while he was still a student, the service was unable to build significant traction and closed early in 2015. Before long Horie was back to work. After dropping a few hints about his project to DeNA founder Tomoko Namba at TIA Tokyo 2015, he unveiled Kurashiru. A video curation service, it specializes in producing easy cooking videos. Broadcasting 1,000 videos a month, it is most popular with young, professional women.

Anglers

Just keep swimming. Photo credit: Pixabay.

Flipping fins is getting Anglers pretty far. The app, which connects fishermen keen on recording and sharing their latest catch of the sea, just scored at least US$200,000 in funding from 500 Startups Japan and Ignis Ltd. The startup did not share precise investment terms.

Niche lifestyle apps are a growing segment in Japan’s savvy consumer market. Earlier this year, Yamap – which focuses on hikers – took US$1.5 million. Fishing is a popular pastime in the island nation, and Anglers is positioned to capitalize on the latent interest.

Aperza

Photo credit: Pexels.

A little over a year after launching Cluez, an online catalog for manufacturing materials, Aperza announced a US$1.5 million round from GMO Venture Partners. With 1,500 registered companies, it is able to provide users with approximately 5,500 catalogs.

As a one-stop shop, it has 2.6 million items listed for semiconductors, plumbing, raw materials, and more.

Neurospace

A good night’s rest is hard to come by for many working Japanese. Sommnie, a sleep-improvement program from Neurospace is working to fix that. Already counting major firms like DeNA and Panasonic Solution Technology among its clients, the startup uses proprietary algorithms, big data analytics, and sleep counseling techniques to improve the quality of sleep.

The size of the round was not disclosed. Glocalink was the primary investor.

SnSnap

Selfies are inseparable from the messaging app boom. Photo credit: Ellen De Vos.
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Japanese startups are far more likely to exit via IPO than acquisition, but SnSnap is helping change that trend. An offline-to-online marketing service that specialized in amplifying the social reach of photos taken by event attendees, SnSnap was snatched up by private equity firm New Holding Capital.

Founded by Yuta Nishigaki, the startup shows how Japan’s ecosystem is growing. Nishigaki was an early member of [Spacemarket] – a leading company in Japan’s sharing economy – but struck out on his own after about a year at the startup. Less than two years later, he now has an exit to show for it.

Japan Info

Photo credit: tomas1111 / 123RF Stock Photo.

Another exit comes from Japan Info, an online media portal dedicated to promoting and explaining Japanese culture and life. The second startup (and exit) by Yuya Haraguchi found its groove early and is now a part of the G-Plus Media family.

G-Plus Media has been on a buying spree of late, adding similarly themed English-language content sites like Japan Today and GaijinPot to its holdings.

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